Reamde

by Neal Stephenson

one cannot call him profoundly mediocre without venturing so far out on the critical limb as to bend it to the ground,”

“to say he is tin-eared would render a disservice to a blameless citizen of the periodic table of the elements”),

A trace of a smile came onto his face. “This is why I never wanted to work in a technology company.” “What do you mean?” “It is a classic Dilbert situation where the technical objectives are being set by management who are technically clueless and driven by these, I don’t know, inscrutable motives.”

The GPS unit became almost equally obstreperous, though, over Richard’s unauthorized route change, until they finally passed over some invisible cybernetic watershed between two possible ways of getting to their destination, and it changed its fickle little mind and began calmly telling him which way to proceed as if this had been its idea all along.

“I know British,” he said. “Looking like idiot is part of being British. Happens all the time. They understand. Have procedures.”